Marlene Dumas: Against the Wall

Description

Described in a 2008 New York Times profile as 'one of contemporary art's most compelling painters', Marlene Dumas has continuously explored the complex range of human emotions, often probing questions of gender, race, sexuality, and economic inequality through her dramatic and at times haunting figural compositions. Originally published in 2010 on the occasion of Against the Wall, Dumas's first solo presentation at David Zwirner in New York, this much sought-after exhibition catalogue - which sold out shortly after publication - has been reprinted in 2014 to coincide with the artist's European retrospective exhibition The Image as Burden, organized by Tate Modern, London, in collaboration with the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, and the Fondation Beyeler, Basel, traveling through 2015. The large-scale works included in Against the Wall are primarily based on media imagery and newspaper clippings documenting Israel and Palestine, exploring the tension between the photographic documentation of reality and the constructed, imaginary space of painting. The sombre colour plates reproduced in the publication are given context by Dumas's own musings, a text framed as a letter to David Zwirner in which she tries to tell him 'about the why' of this powerful series.

Widely regarded as one of the most influential painters working today, Marlene Dumas has continuously explored the complex range of human emotions, often probing questions of gender, race, sexuality, and economic inequality. Through her focus on the human figure, Dumas merges socio-political themes with personal experience and art-historical antecedents to create a unique perspective on the most salient and controversial issues facing contemporary society. Her work consistently explores constructions of identity and the fluid distinctions between the public and the private.

"Making her paint rawer yet layering it with radiating undercurrents of off-color; her distortions, elongations, and ways of handling crowds have more poignancy and focus... I like that there' something skittish and haunted to Dumas's touch."--Jerry Saltz "New York Magazine" "I find it hard to shake off the effects of 'Against the Wall'... their impact is undeniable."--Howard Halle "Time Out New York" "One of the most provocative painters of the human form, South African-born artist Marlene Dumas doesn't match the stereotype of artist as solitary genius. Her way is chaotic, more responsive and uncertain - and that is her brilliance."--Claire Messud "The New York Times, T Magazine" "The palpable desolation in these paintings conveys an oddly imposing emptiness, as if despite being sparse, they are also full to bursting."--Benjamin Sutton "The L Magazine" "This show marks a significant point of departure in Dumas' practice; for the entirety of her artistic career the human figure and face have been her subject and here for almost the first time she turns her hand to space, architecture, and most unusually still life." --The Editors "Art Observed" "We are lucky to have Dumas, and other artists, help focus our attention and see this, and other dilemmas from a new perspective."--Patricia Zohn "The Huffington Post"